


The Beatles are Still Making Music, Right??

by mythomusicians



Series: Side Mythos [4]
Category: Bandom, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, But Brendon is a dumb flirty 14 year old so i mean its still ryden, Gen, It's not even an alternate universe its the TRUTH, It's not really Ryden I lied to you, OH HOW ITS BEEN SO LONG, Pre-Band, Pre-Split, Ryan Ross the Beatles Fanboy, This is the True Story of Ryan Ross, WE WERE BUSY WRITING FICS FOR, WERE SO SORRY WEVE BEEN GONE, YOU!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-17
Updated: 2016-11-28
Packaged: 2018-06-02 19:39:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 20,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6579742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mythomusicians/pseuds/mythomusicians
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>14 year old Spencer Smith gets stuck in an abandoned house on a dumb dare from Brendon and Brent. It's supposed to be haunted, or have serial killers or something. No one's lived there in decades and it's weird and spooky and a little damp on the inside. But Spencer isn't a wimp. He's gonna spend the night, even if it kills him. Even if there is a weird padlocked door. Hey, the padlock is pretty rusty. Maybe he can break it off.</p><p>(This Is The True Origin Story of George Ryan Ross III)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Oh my gosh, we've been so inactive for so long. We feel really bad. But we've been writing non-stop! Just not in our main fic. This style of writing is a bit of a divergence from how we normally like to present fanfiction. It's actually copy pasted back and forth texts. So basically RP. But it's linear, and readable. We promise. It's what we've been obsessively doing for months now, instead of working on And Back Again like we NEED to be. We're in too deep into our universe, my friends. There's so much we have that we want to show you all that we can't post until we finish ABA. We'll get there, we promise. But until then! We have this we can post! Enjoy, fave, comment, we love feedback. Follow our blog on tumblr for updates and PROOF!!!!!!!

There have been a lot of rumors about the abandoned building in their neighborhood. Some say people who go in never come out. Some say a serial killer lives there. Some say just the decrepit walls and ceilings will fall and kill you.    
So naturally, it's no surprise that when Spencer is with Brendon and Brent, they dare him to spend the night in the building. Spencer obviously would have refused, but it so wouldn't be worth all the name calling. He can't go to school on Monday with them calling him a chicken. So, that's how he found himself standing in front of the door to the building with only a flashlight and a backpack. 

Honestly he should get some better friends. They're total jerks.

 

"Dude just go in and find someplace and go to sleep," Brendon eggs him on. "Like, it's not fucking hard. None of those rumors are true."    
"If they're not true then why won't _you_  spend the night?" Brent counters, superstitious as fuck.    
"My parents have a curfew, remember? Home by 10 unless your parents call to say I'm spending the night."

 

"Whatever, whatever." Spencer sighs, not really liking this idea, but he's already too deep to go back now. "Couldn't give me more than a flashlight?"   
"I don't think a knife or anything will fend off ghosts." Brent says.    
At least it's a warm spring night, so it isn't like he'll freeze to death in there. Maybe. Hopefully not.    
"Come on just get going!" Brendon shoves at his shoulders to push him closer to the building. "We'll come back at nine to make sure you're still alive."   
"Gee thanks."

 

Spencer heads in, and holy shit it's fucking dark as hell he needs a lantern, not a flashlight. "Have fun searching for my body tomorrow," he says before shutting the door behind him.    
"Don't be an ass," he hears Brendon call, and then the sound of footsteps leaving confirm that he is in fact alone for the night in this creepy hellhole.

 

Spencer sighs as he looks around from where he's standing. Honestly it seems like all the makings of a classic horror movie. White sheets covering furnishings, boarded up windows, and just a general smell of being old. Spence is half expecting Brendon and Brent to just pop out at him during the night to try and scare him.    
Dicks.

 

If he's gonna die, he's gonna die doing something fucking awesome like exploring this place. He starts looking around, slowly, going from room to room. He starts actually feeling relatively safe after a while, not hearing any sounds or seeing anything move out of the corner of his eye. He's decided to stay on this floor, though.

 

After getting a feel for the area, his only real fear is that the police are gonna show up and bust him for trespassing.    
He decides to make 'camp' at what seems to be the living room, placing his bag down. He did bring a few things with him, but nothing that seems particularly useful if there's a threat. Some snacks, a pillow, a lighter in case his batteries die, a watch. That's about it. Brendon and Brent didn't exactly give him much notice to pack things to stay in the spooky house. But right now, it's just kinda damp smelling. Nothing spooky.

 

He sets up where he's decided to sleep, on the floor, but second guesses it when he realizes there's definitely a couch under one of these sheets. Like, it's super obvious. But it could be super gross, too. He figures if the couch is nasty he can just lay on top of the white sheet or something, and hell, he can use other sheets as blankets. It's a little colder in the house than he expected.

 

As he looks around a bit more with the flashlight, he sees that there's a fireplace not too far off from the couches. That could provide some light and warmth. He's a pro at this survival shit. He finds some logs sitting by it, a bit damp but he figures they could probably still light. He rips some of the sheet to use as a starter, lighting it with the lighter and tossing it into the fireplace. It takes a few minutes but it does finally catch, and the room is illuminated enough for him to turn off his flashlight. There. Not that spooky now, is it? Maybe he'll even explore a bit more.

 

He gets warm before looking around more. There are a few closed doors, probably bedrooms. Why the fuck not, right? He's come this far. The first one he opens is in fact a bedroom, normal bedroom shit inside and everything. No skeletons in the closet, even.

 

The more he looks around, the more disappointed he gets. He wasn't exactly expecting ghosts in every room or something, but it just seems so... plain.    
At the end of a hall he finds what appears to be a door that was padlocked shut, but the lock has rusted to the point where it's barely hanging there. He could get in there. There's gotta be  _ something _ interesting in there if it was locked up.

 

He heads over to it and pulls at the lock, but it won't even budge. He looks around a bit for some stupid reason, probably to make sure he's alone, before kicking at the lock. He snaps it by force but cringes at the sound it makes. It sounds so loud in this abandoned house. Still, the door's open now.

 

As long as there aren't any serial killers in here, he should be fine. He takes a moment to recover from just how loud the clash was, and he opens the door slowly.   
This would be where people in the audience would be yelling at him to not go in. But it's too late, he's already in.    
When he shines the light around, he sees some sort of machinery. That's strange. How old is this building? He goes over to the big screens and boards, full of dusty symbols he doesn't really understand at all. And there's a button. Shit. It's a big button. He wants to press it.

 

He battles with himself, his rational side telling him that big mysterious buttons are bad and do not press it Spencer are you stupid? But he's young. So yeah, he's pretty damn stupid. It takes a bit but his reckless side tells him to PUSH THE BUTTON COME ON it's so BIG. So he does. He pushes the damn button because he's a stupid motherfucker with a goddamn death wish.

 

Nothing really seems to happen. What the heck. What kind of button does nothi- oh everything is lighting up. Um. Maybe the button wasn't a good idea. What if this is some kind of smart house shit where it's going to trap him in here?   
The room lights up with blue screens with a bunch of 0s and 1s on their display, and he hears some sort of whirring. Is this thing going to overheat? What if it explodes? Well, at least if he dies, it was because he pushed a huge ass button.    
His demise seems to come to a stop though when he hears some scuffling behind him.    
"Hello?"

 

"Shit, what the fuck?" Spencer turns around. Despite all the light from the screens, he still can't see for shit. He sees a figure, though, at least it looks kind of like a person. Fuck. He's gonna fucking die. All because he had to press the damn button Spencer you fucking idiot what the hell.

 

He's gotta admit though. It was totally fun to cross off 'push huge button' off his bucket list.    
"Who are you?" The figure steps into view and Spencer sees that it looks like some kid that's around his age. The kid takes a step again but is stopped, and Spencer sees that there's a bunch of cables and the like attached to him. "You're not..." He seems to trail off, trying to think about something.

 

"Who am I?" Spencer responds quietly, a bit in shock. "Who are you?  _ What  _ are you?" Am I gonna die? He doesn't ask, he doesn't want to know the answer to that one. What the hell is a kid doing locked up in an old house? Why's he got so many wires on him? Spencer doesn't dare take any steps closer. If the weird kid can't move forward towards him, he's totally fine with that.

 

"Who am I?" He asks quietly, looking back at the wires and everything attached to him. After a moment of thinking, he suddenly looks back at Spencer. "I was turned off." He says, then thinks again. "What year is it?"   
Turned off? What the fuck. What the fuck is going on. Big button equals bad. Lesson learned.

 

"What.. What year is it..?" Spencer frowns. What the fuck is happening. "It's the millennium, dude, 2000." He doesn't move. He thinks about hitting the button again, maybe that will turn whatever this is off?? But he seems really confused.

 

"Shit." He says, pulling at his wires a bit to try and get them loose. "It's been thirty years."    
Thirty years??? What???   
"Hey." He directs his attention back to Spencer. "The Beatles are still doing shows, right? They're like the biggest name in music still?"   
What.

 

"Wha..? No, dude, they broke up a long time ago," why the hell does this kid care about the Beatles? 30 years? What the fuck does any of that mean?    
"What the hell is going on?"

 

"Haha, right, jokes. Those are still things." He says, stepping back to try and see where his cables are connected to so he can break them loose. He soon enough does and stretches his arms out a bit. "What's your name?" He asks, looking him over. Fashion's gotten weird.

 

"Not joking," Spencer takes a couple steps back. "They broke up. Why should I tell you my name? I don't even know what the fuck you are."

 

"Never really liked jokes." He frowns and shakes his head, deciding not to dwell on that. "I'm Ryan." He says, offering a hand out to shake. That's still a greeting in these days right? God, he has a lot to catch up on. Why was he even shut off in the first place? He has too many questions to think about them all right now.

 

Spencer eyes his hand warily. "You're not going to like, shock me?" His name is Ryan. That's like, really normal. He expected some weird string of numbers or letters or some shit. Damn, there's not like, 30 more of this guy hiding somewhere is there?   
"No, I'm not going to shock you," Ryan rolls his eyes. "Do I really look that threatening?"

 

Spencer gives him a once over. Honestly, he looks just like he could be his classmate or something. A lot less creepy without all those wires hooked up to him. He hesitantly reaches out to his hand and grasps it, finding himself surprised that he honestly just feels normal. "What  _ are  _ you?" He asks again. He can't be something human right?

 

Ryan frowns a bit. This guy comes into _ his _ home and demands answers? "Fucking classified," he says. "What are you doing here, anyway? Seriously, man, this is private property. People live here."

 

Classified? What, is he supposed to be some secret government weapon or something ?   
"Live here? No they don't." Spencer makes a face. "Place is abandoned as shit. My friends dared me to spend the night here."

 

"Abandoned..." Ryan's face goes a bit blank. Abandoned? They- they just turned him off and left him here? He had friends, he had hobbies. They were practically his family. "No, there's got to be some mistake," he says after a short while, trying not to panic. He's alone. 30 years later and still 14 and completely alone. "They can't have.."

 

"Place looks like shit." Spencer says frankly. "If there was someone here, I'm sure I would've seen them." He looks around a bit around the blue-hued room. "Are you a robot or something?"

 

Ryan sighs. No sense in keeping his secret now. Who knows, maybe robots are commonplace in 2000? "I'm the world's first bio robotic Artificial Intelligence," he explains, slowly, to make sure the kid gets each word. "Guess I'm the only one left living here, then."

  
"Bio..." Spencer frowns a bit. "So a fancy way of saying you're a robot?"    
"Android." Ryan corrects.


	2. Chapter 2

"Is that like some politically correct term or is there actually a difference?" Spencer asks. "Oh, shit, Spencer by the way." Ryan already had introduced himself and Spencer hadn't done the same. As freaked out as he is, he isn't a rude piece of shit.

 

"There's a gigantic difference, man. Robots have certain functions they can perform, androids learn." Ryan frowns at the human boy. "I also age. When I'm on, anyway," he mutters. Bitter. Upset. Still not totally grasping that he was literally abandoned by everyone he knew. For no understandable reason.

 

Spencer puts his hands up defensively. "This is the first time I ever set foot in here. I have no clue what happened to whoever was here before." He doesn't want Ryan to snap and start attacking him or something. That's a robotty thing to do, he's seen it in movies.    
But then again, androids are apparently different than robots. Who knew?

 

"Yeah, I've gathered that." Ryan sighs and moves to leave the room, heading back towards the living room. His old living room. Spencer follows after him, curious and a little scared and worried that maybe he was shut off because he wanted like, world domination or something.

 

At seeing the fireplace lit, Ryan gets a brush of hope at hopefully seeing the people who took care of him there, but all that there is this kid's, Spencer's, belongings. As he looks around though, he feels his chest beat a bit faster. He wasn't kidding. This place looks like it's been empty for years.    
Ryan still refuses to believe what he said about The Beatles though. There's no way that's true.

 

"I told you, dude, no one lives here anymore," Spencer moves and sits on the couch, opening a snack. "I don't really know what to tell you. Sorry people just left or whatever." He shrugs. He doesn't completely give a shit about this thing. It's not like it's human, it doesn't really have emotions.

 

Ryan just stands there staring at the fire for a while. They left him. Why would they leave him? They had said he was making great progress, and there would be no need to shut him down if things continued as planned. Did something not go to plan? They wouldn't just leave him like this... Ryan wipes at his eyes as he feels his tears start falling. Why would they just leave..?

 

"You okay..?" Spencer frowns. From behind it almost looks like he's crying. Can androids cry? "You hungry or something..?" Can androids eat?

 

"I'm fine." Ryan answers, his tone of voice wavering and proving otherwise. He was abandoned and locked in a room for thirty years. Why? He wipes at his eyes some more before turning back to Spencer. Food sounds really good, considering he hasn't eaten in so long.

 

Spencer gets the hint. "Here," he offers him a granola bar. It's not much, but it's all he's got. "Sorry I've been kind of an ass. Androids don't really exist in the real world.." Well, apparently they actually do. At least one exists.

 

"Oh." He comments, taking the bar from Spencer and taking a seat by the fire to warm himself up. So he's still the only one.. Ryan sighs and takes a bite of the granola bar, finding that food is still really freakin' good. At least that hasn't changed. He tries to ration it out though. He's on his own now. Who knows next time he'll find food? On his own... How is he supposed to do this? With no one helping him? Guiding him? Shit. Maybe he should just ask Spencer to turn him off again.

 

"You know, my parents wouldn't mind if you needed a place to stay for a couple days. Give 'em some bullshit reason like your parents are fighting or something. They're real nice," Spencer offers. Why is he offering? He can't help but think of the android as a person. He looks like a person. Acts like a person. Eats like a person, even. How's a kid like Ryan supposed to live in a dump like this?

 

"I shouldn't inconvenience you." Ryan says, looking down at the granola bar. He's already helped a lot. Let him know what year it is, gave him food. Oh, and turned him back on. That's kind of important too. "But if you insist, thanks." He looks to Spencer with a small smile. After so long without interaction, he feels like he needs this. To get out of here for a while. Maybe figure out why exactly he was shut off. "I'll try not to stay in your hair too long."

 

"It's nothing," Spencer manages a smile back at him. "Just don't tell anyone you're a robot-"   
"Android."   
"Right. Android. Just don't tell anyone that you're not human. My friends are coming back at 9 to see if I survived the night." He offers him a second granola bar. 30 years is a long time without food. "We can get you breakfast, show you what's happened in the world."    
  


Ryan gladly takes the second one, deciding to sit down by the human. It's strange to not be watched, seeing someone taking notes from the corner of your eye. It's just the two of them. It's a strange feeling. He doesn't remember last time he's felt this alone. Lonely. He sighs and hugs his knees to his chest with a frown. How's he supposed to survive in a world that is thirty years ahead of him?

 

Spencer eats his granola bar in silence for a little while. He's admittedly pretty tired. It's late, after all. Probably midnight. "Hey," he says quietly after a while. "What was your life like? Like, what did you do? Did you go to school?" If he blends in as a human, he could see him being outstanding in class. He probably learns better than most kids his age. Unless that's not actually an android thing.

 

"I didn't really go to a school." Ryan says. "The people that I was with, the scientists, they're the ones who taught me things. But, not an official school with other people or anything." He thinks back a bit more. "Music was good. I really like music." Ryan suddenly gets up, wondering if his guitar is still somewhere in the living room or if they'd gotten rid of it too.

 

"Yeah, you said the Beatles? They were a cool band," Spencer comments. The Beatles are admittedly pretty much the only thing he really knows about from 30 years ago. "I like music too. Blink-182 is the shit."

 

"What's that?" Ryan looks back at him in vague confusion. Is that a new band? What a strange name.    
He soon finds his guitar under one of the white sheets, and it looks damaged and dusty, but it's still in tact. Ryan relaxes a bit at the familiarity of it, bringing it back over to show off to Spencer.

 

"They're like, pop punk. Like Green Day and shit. I'll show you tomorrow, you wouldn't have heard it." Spencer watches as Ryan brings back the guitar. "Dude that looks fuckin old as hell," he looks at the old guitar. Then back to Ryan. "Shit, no offense."

 

"None taken." He assures him. It hasn't been used in thirty years, he knows it looks old. Ryan gives it a strum, frowning at how out of tune it sounds. He supposes he should be lucky that the string didn't just up and snap at him or something.    
He looks back to Spencer for a moment, studying him quietly. He hasn't really met anyone his own age before. The scientists were always much older than him. "Are we friends?" He asks. Friend is a new concept to him. He supposes he was friends with some of the people here, but they weren't his age or anything.

 

Spencer gives it some thought. He seems like a good enough kid, and he even offered his home to him. And his granola bars. He shrugs. "Yeah. We're friends," he smiles at the android. "Never had a friend before?" Seems kind of weird. If they were studying him, how did they gauge his social interaction? Science can be fucked up.

 

Ryan shakes his head. "None my age." He supposes he's technically older than Spencer by at least thirty years. "Thank you." Times are going to be strange, but at least now he has a friend to help.

 

Spencer rests a hand on Ryan's back. "No problem, dude. You tired? I'm tired as hell." He mostly just wants to skip to tomorrow. Help Ryan out. Show him y2k. Video games. Music. Tv. All that awesome shit.

 

"I've been asleep for thirty years." Ryan laughs a bit but nods. Being turned off isn't the same as sleeping. He could go for some rest. "Get some sleep, then."

 

"Thanks, man. Do androids even sleep? Do you dream?" Spencer has about 40 questions coming to mind as he lays down, making himself comfortable. Ryan stands and adds some wood to the fire with a light laugh at his questions.

 

"I'm made to be more human than animatronic." Ryan answers. "I'll be right back." He heads off to one of the abandoned rooms and finds some old blankets in the closet, grabbing a few and tossing them at Spencer. "So yes, we do dream. Different than how humans do. You guys see images, I see numbers."

 

"Numbers.." Spencer repeats, thinking about how weird that is. "Like in the Matrix? Oh, wait, you don't know what that is," Spencer laughs a bit. It's hard to have a conversation with someone who knows nothing about pop culture. "Add that to the list of things I have to show you." He gratefully lays the blankets over himself and puts the pillow under his head. "Long day tomorrow," he says to the android with a smile. "Get some shut eye, robot boy."

  
"Android." Ryan corrects again, but smiles nonetheless. A friend. Someone agreed to be his friend even after he probably scared the shit out of him.    
He makes himself comfortable on the other end of the couch, taking a breath. Ryan still has so many questions and none of them seem to be able to be answered. But, as Spencer said, sleep. He'll get some sleep and figure it out tomorrow. He closes his eyes and lets his systems go into sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

Spencer wakes up way too gosh dang early. It's definitely not 9 yet, probably more like 7. He sits up and looks over at Ryan and yeah, he's still asleep in about the same position he fell asleep in. He's breathing though, which is weird to Spencer. Didn't expect an android needed to breathe. But if Ryan said he's more human than animatronic, then he supposes oxygen could be important somehow to the AI. He kicks at him gently from under the blankets, seeing if he'll stir.

Ryan doesn't stir at all. Does he need some sort of charging station or something, Spencer wonders.    
It isn't until exactly eight that Ryan finally seems to wake. He sits up looking way too tired still, pulling the blanket a bit tighter around him. "An hour till your friends come, yeah?" He asks him tiredly, rubbing at his eyes. Some people say they have internal alarm clocks but for Ryan it's more of a literal sense. Before he went to sleep he knew he should wake an hour before the others would arrive. How is Spencer going to explain finding an animatronic to his friends without telling them what he is?

"About an hour," Spencer nods. "Do you have a last name?" Shit, he hasn't really thought far ahead. They have an hour to come up with some kind of believable backstory for this kid.

"Ross." He answers. "The last name of the head scientist.” Ryan adjusts the blanket again before getting up to restart the fire. It's a lot chillier than he would have expected. "Forgive me for saying." He starts, turning back to Spencer after the flames start back up. "But are your friends really that nice if they'd trap you in here for the night?"

"It's just a dumb dare," Spencer waves off Ryan's comment. "They didn't think anything bad would actually happen to me." They'd be total jerks if they actually thought he was gonna bite it here. They totally had confidence in the fact that this place being haunted or whatever was total folklore.

Ryan nods a bit, still rather unsure about meeting these friends of his. And being outside. Seeing how different the world is.    
It doesn't feel like too long before they hear loud knocking on the door. "You dead yet, Spin?"

"Spin?" Ryan questions and Spencer shakes his head as he re-packs his bag.    
"My nickname." Spencer goes and opens the door to Brent and Brendon with Ryan just behind him. "So dead I made a friend," he shoves his bag into Brendon's confused hands with a smile.

"You made friends with a ghost?" Brent asks with a frown.    
Ryan decides to pop into view and gives a wave. "Not a ghost." He says. "Running away from home." He lies. Spencer had said something about a cover of his parents fighting right? So it would make sense to give an answer like that.

Besides, it's not altogether untrue. This is his home, and he's going to be leaving it.    
"Parents assholes?" Brent asks and Ryan shrugs.    
"Too many restrictions. And they fight and take it out on me," he frowns. Also not exactly untrue. His rules growing up were incredibly strict and he didn't exactly have particular parent figures in his life. The scientists would argue about rules for him, how much in society he should be allowed, should he go to school or not, can he have friends, should they try to teach him about religion, when his bedtime should be programmed, everything.

"Yeah, I know a fuckin thing or two about restrictive parents." Brendon says, rolling his eyes.    
"Figured he could stay with me for a while until he works things out." Spencer says.    
Ryan smiles a bit, still thankful for Spencer's help. As he looks past Spencer's two friends, he can already see that the outside looks different. The lawn is unkept, things look abandoned and broken. So they really did just leave him..

"So what's your name? Where you from?" Brent asks as they head away from the building.    
"Ryan, I'm.. From nearby, but I’d rather not talk about it. Never really been here before." He avoids answering things directly, and everything's changed. Style especially. He supposes he was lucky he was turned off in jeans and a t-shirt or he'd have trouble fitting in. Shit. He didn't even think about clothes.    
"Let's get the guy some breakfast," Brendon says as he bounces down the pathway. "Fuckin' IHOP or some shit. Come on, or Denny's? They're always serving breakfast."

He sees Brendon looking back at him for some sort of preference and Ryan shrugs, not really knowing the difference between them. "Whichever. Food is food." Ryan tries his best to be personable, trying to get a feel for how modern conversation does.

"Sweet, so IHOP. Oh," Brendon hops around to face Ryan, continuing to skip backwards. "You smoke?"    
"What, cigarettes?" Ryan raises an eyebrow.    
"No, shit gives you cancer. Weed, dude. You smoke grass?"

"I..." Ryan shakes his head. "Haven't tried." He's heard about it, but the scientists never told him what it was. So since he was a good android he never asked about it. Apparently whatever it is is popular around people his age.

Brendon pulls a couple of joints out of his back pocket. "I've only got two but we can all share."    
"Here, I've got a light," Spin gets behind Brendon to get into his backpack to fetch his lighter.    
Brent rolls his eyes. "Let's at least wait until /after/ breakfast?"

"Where's the fun in that?" Brendon laughs, taking the lighter from Spencer and lighting one before handing it back to Spencer. "Pre-breakfast and post-breakfast." He grins, taking a drag from it. "Oh shit, we didn't even introduce ourselves did we?"

Ryan shakes his head. "No, you didn't," he completely forgot. He doesn't even know their names yet. Brendon hands Spencer the joint and Spencer takes a drag from it as well, smiling after he does so. Ryan wonders if it will even affect him. It ought to, if he was created right.

"Well I guess you already know Spencer." Brendon says, then points over to Brent. "That's Brent. He's really lame." He then points to himself. "And I'm Brendon. The coolest guy you'll ever meet."   
Spencer laughs at that. "Yeah, you keep thinkin' that one, buddy." He holds the joint out to Ryan. "Wanna give it a shot?"

Ryan frowns at it. "Um," he takes it from Spencer and considers it for a moment before handing it back. "After breakfast," he promises. "Thanks for the hospitality. Sorry I have no money or anything," he addresses Brent and Brendon. "It was kind of.. Spur of the moment. Leaving home."

"Don't worry about it." Brendon says, nabbing the joint from Spencer before he can take a drag from it. "Shitty family life is a common thing. Do what you've got to, man." He takes a drag from it, and shortly after, Ryan can see what he assumes is the ihop not too far off.    
"God I'm hungry." Brent comments.    
"Try living the night off of fuckin' granola bars and get back to me." Spencer says, taking the joint back from Brendon to finish it off before they get in.

"What are you all going to order?" Ryan asks the group as Spencer flicks what's left of their joint over in the grass somewhere. Really he's just not sure what people eat these days. Are there still like, meals? 30 years isn't too long, but Ryan's only 14. It's more than twice how long he's lived.

"Pancakes is usually my go-to." Brent says as they walk in and get seated. The waitress hands them the menus. "They're cheap and good."   
"But boring as fuck." Brendon says, flipping through the menu. "I'm more of a complete breakfast guy. French toast, eggs, bacon."   
"You even have enough money for that?" Spencer frowns at him. "I don't think you'd ever save up your allowance just to waste it on breakfast."   
"Nabbed my mom's credit card from her purse before we left." Brendon says, setting the menu down. "I'm all good. I'll pay for you, Ry, no worries." He grins at him.

"Um, thanks," Ryan smiles at the kid. Eating breakfast on stolen money? Ryan couldn't have imagined this before he went to bed 30 years ago if he tried. He looks over the menu, deciding on a pancake breakfast with eggs and sausage. Can't go wrong with that, he figures. Throws in some orange juice, too.    
"So tell me your story, Ryan," Brent smiles at their newest addition. "What kind of things do you like?"

"My story.." Ryan thinks for a bit, trying to figure what he can say without giving himself away as not being a normal kid from this era. "Music is good." He decides to start with. "Beatles and stuff." The android still totally refuses to believe Spencer about the fact they're broken up.

"Beatles? You ever listen to Blink? Way cooler than the Beatles," Brendon says casually while the waitress shows up for food orders. "Play any instruments?"

"Restrictive parents." He reminds Brendon. Figures that's a good enough reason for not being caught up on the times. "But yeah, I play guitar." Ryan smiles a bit. He might have to backtrack to his house, his house?, before staying with Spencer to grab his guitar. As old as it is, it's really the only thing from there that's still important to him.

"No way, awesome. Spin might have told you already but he plays the drums!" Brendon smiles. "I'm learning drums too," he laughs.   
"I know bass pretty well," Brent adds, a little peeved Brendon didn't mention that.

"That's pretty cool." Ryan smiles a bit. "Almost like a full crew here, huh?"    
"Pretty much." Spencer grins and drums a bit on the table impatiently before the waitress comes back with their food orders.

Ryan looks down at his food. It looks pretty normal, honestly. Smells delicious, better than the stuff the scientists would make. "Thanks again," Ryan smiles at Brendon before digging in. It's pretty damn good, honestly. Way more sugar than he's normally allowed to have. His caretakers always made sure he had balanced meals with the right nutritional value and shit. This is not that. This is better.

"You act like you haven't eaten in years." Brendon laughs.    
"I haven't had a real meal in th-... A while." Ryan says, slathering his pancakes with more syrup. "Breakfast at home usually consisted of fruit, an egg, toast, and orange juice." He explains.   
"No cereal?" Brent asks incredulously.    
"Cheerios if I was lucky." He laughs a bit.

"Was your dad in the military or something??" Brendon raises an eyebrow and Ryan gives a light laugh.    
"No, you could say he was a scientist. Big on nutrition for me and making sure I got everything I needed." He sighs a bit. They're gone. All of his caretakers, the people he considered 'family.' "My.. My parents were great, really, but.. Things just changed so much so fast. You know? And I was growing and they, uh, they didn't really want to accept that." He doesn't believe a word of that. The scientists always wanted him to grow up, be healthy, learn to be a functioning adult. Which is why he's so confused. Why did they abandon him? Shut him off and leave who knows how long after?

"Don't look so glum, dude." Brendon frowns at him. "Shit happens. Just gotta take it a step at a time."   
"Look at you gettin all fuckin' philosophical." Spencer laughs.    
"No but seriously, man." Brendon looks at Ryan. "Shit really sucks more than half the time, but just think about when we're older and won't need to rely on others. Livin' our dreams and shit."   
"You're really being optimistic." Brent observes.    
Brendon shrugs as he stuffs his face with bacon. "Good weed."


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean we have no excuse, the whole thing is written we just keep forgetting to update. Love you, thanks for reading. Feel free to give us feedback or headcanons and shit we love that shit

Ryan smiles lightly at Brendon. "Thanks. Means a lot." He eats more slowly after that, and quietly, listening to the chatter of friends. Eventually there's a lull in the conversation as most of them finish their meals, so Ryan decides to speak up.

"What are your dreams?" He asks, mainly towards Brendon.

"Hunh?" 

"You said earlier, when we're older and living our dreams. What are yours?" He asks as he takes one of the last bites of his pancakes.

"My dreams?" Brendon leans back in his seat a bit. "To make people happy." He smiles a bit. "Whether it's through music or some other shit."

"Big dreams, man." Spencer says, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Ever think about selling weed?" Brent laughs a bit. 

"Ha ha, fuck you," Brendon nudges Brent with his elbow. "I'm not that stupid. What about you, new guy? What are your dreams?"

"I.." Ryan frowns. He thought he'd end up being with the scientists his whole life. He didn't really have plans for himself, they're always the ones that had plans for him. As much as they allowed him free will and such, they usually dictated every part of his life for him. This is the first time he's actually making decisions completely for himself. "Music. I want to play music. I want to play with The Beatles-"

"You mean _like_ The Beatles." Spencer quickly corrects him.

"...Sure," Ryan agrees, frowning at his phrasing. There's no way. "Like the Beatles. Guitar and writing songs and shit." 

"You know they smoked shit tons of weed, right?" Brendon laughs. "You're with the right guys!"

Ryan laughs a bit. "Good to know." He manages to relax, figuring that these guys aren't bad. They seem to care. Or at least are curious about him. And they're letting him live his life. Make his own choices. Thirty years is a big change to get used to, but with these guys around, maybe it'll be a bit easier. 

"If we all enjoy music maybe we should have a jam session some time." Brent suggests.

"Yeah, I'll show Ryan some Blink and shit when we get home, maybe you'll pick right up on it?" Spencer slaps Ryan's back playfully and Ryan smiles back at him. He has friends. Plural. This will be fine. He'll figure it out. 

"Oh, shit, that reminds me," Ryan lies. He remembered a while ago. "I left my guitar at h- at the abandoned building."

"We'll swing around back there to grab that old deteriorated thing, then." Spencer says, figuring that he'll probably want to grab some of his belongings too. 

"I still have my mom's card." Brendon says with a smirk. "We can always grab you a new one if the other plays like shit."

A new guitar sounds nice. Like, super tempting. But the old thing is pretty much all he has left of the 60s. "No, it's fine." Ryan finds himself saying. "My guitar is.. It was.. It's really important to me. It's old and beat up, but it's important."

"The offer still stands if you decide otherwise." Brendon shrugs, shoving the rest of his French toast into his mouth as the waiter comes back with their checks. 

"Aren't you going to get in trouble for using her card?" Brent asks. 

Brendon waves it off as he puts the card in the book without even looking at the price. "What's she gonna do to me? Kick me out? I'll just get like grounded for a week or some shit, she doesn't care."

"You don't like your parents at all?" Ryan questions. If they let him get away with that much, why would he hate them?

"No, no, I love my parents," Brendon clarifies. "They're just way too uptight and strict and shit. They believe in God, and I don't. They believe in eternal consequences, I don't." Simple as that, honestly. 

"But he hasn't told them he doesn't, yet," Brent smirks.

"I'm workin' up to it, okay?" Brendon frowns at Brent. "It isn't easy to tell them."

"Come on, it isn't like you're coming out as gay to them or whatever." Spencer says. "It shouldn't be _that_ difficult to say you don't believe in what they do. They're the ones who forced their beliefs on you without letting you make a decision about it."

Brendon turns his frown to Spencer. He really does love his parents a lot, despite the shit he says. He doesn't like it when others assume that he hates them or anything. Because they do care and want what they think is best for him. But what Brendon thinks is best isn't what they think.

"No, I get it," Ryan says simply. "They want something for you that they think is great. But you want something else." He understands. He really does. He had bigger dreams growing up for himself than his caretakers had for him. He still does. Play with the Beatles. Perform. Do music. He wasn't intended to be quite as human as he turned out. They got the imagination a little too perfect in his systems.

"See, he gets it. Ryan gets it." Brendon goes back to smiling. 

The waiter comes back with their checks and Brendon pockets the card again, deciding to leave a pretty generous tip. It's not his money, and it'll probably make the guy's day, so why not? 

"Let's get out of here." He keeps grinning and pushes at Ryan to get him out of the booth.


	5. Chapter 5

Ryan's admittedly still curious about this weird plastic card nonsense which is, apparently, money. He remembers the scientists having things vaguely similar to it, but they always used cash when they were with Ryan. He'll have to have Spencer explain it later. For now he'll just pretend it's normal, because aside from it being Brendon's mom's card, it sure seems to be normal. He moves to let Brendon out and soon they're all off once again to his old home, this time in bright broad midday sun.

The house doesn't look all too scary when it's bright out.    


"Is it safe in there?" Brent asks, still rather sure that there are ghosts inside. There are definitely ghosts inside.    


"I've been there for a while and I'm still here." Ryan points out. "I'm only going to be a few minutes if you'd prefer to wait out here."

"Well I'll help you pack your things back up," Spencer offers, and Brendon and Brent decide to wait outside. You know. In case they need to get help or something.    


Once they're inside, Ryan immediately heads to the room he was kept in with Spencer, which was previously locked. "Thanks again, man, for everything," Ryan says as he rummages through some weird mechanical things, looking for spare parts he might need to replace himself after all this time in stasis. Who knows if anything got rusty? Does he even get rusty? He shrugs to himself. He doesn't even begin to know anything about the science of himself. They didn't want him to know.

"Do you need like, charging shit or something?" Spencer asks, looking around the room. Ryan said he was more human than robot, but he still has no idea how it works. At what point is he more robotic? Because those wires and things were probably something. "Are you even allowed out of here? For like, safety reasons?"

"Food equals energy," Ryan says as he grabs a few small things, shoving them in his pockets. "And sleep is a daily reboot of my intelligence system." He stands back up and heads to the ancient computers to retrieve his command files, put them on something he can hopefully transfer over to whatever new technology's got. He knows his systems were advanced, at least a few decades ahead of his time, high end experimental government technology type shit. Hopefully it's workable. "And I'm perfectly harmless, thank you very much." If there's one thing he knows his way around technology wise, it's his own brain. His caretakers made sure of that, in case he ever needed to fix his own code. Everything else is one big question mark.

Spencer looks around a bit more before settling on Ryan again. "Can you get internet in your head or something?" It would make sense right? If he's got all this technology, that should be something shouldn't it? Even if the Internet wasn't really much of a thing in the 60s... Maybe he can fix that or something. It'd be a lot easier for him to be able to web search things in his mind than explain everything that happened within such an amount of time.

"Internet?" Ryan questions. Word sounds familiar, if barely. "Um, maybe? I have the prototype of a wireless communications network, if that's what you mean?" Ryan suggests as he backs some more stuff up onto a primitive floppy disk. "But it's just between one particular program and my brain, nothing else." And I'm not showing that to you, he thinks. Or anyone. The master controls were an unused feature for emergencies only. Better safe to have them existing somewhere than end up sorry, but he'd rather they don't exist at all. He likes having control over his own body, thank you.

"You should probably definitely know about the Internet." Spencer decides with a grin. Maybe he can like... absorb it or something. Spencer honestly has no clue how that works. "Do you want me to grab anything for you while you're doing your techy thing?"

"Um, yeah," Spencer's actually perfect for the job he has in mind. "Up the stairs two doors to your left is my old room. If there's anything left," that feels so weird to say. It still feels like just yesterday everything was normal. Routine. Now it's... All gone. "Just go through the clothes and pick out whatever you think won't make me look like I'm from the 60s?"

"Got it. Be back in a flash." Spencer gives him a wave before following his directions and finding his room. Going through his clothes, honestly most of it looks straight from the 60s, there's no doubt about that. There's a shit ton of definitely out of fashion jeans, some print dressy shirts, sweaters... It's pretty hard to find something that can be considered modern. Maybe he could ask Brendon to take him shopping. He grabs some clothes nonetheless, shoving them into a bag and giving the room a once over to see if there's anything else he's missing or should bring. As he looks around, he sees what seems to be a letter addressed to Ryan sitting on his pillow, which is covered in dust and debris that Spencer wouldn't have even noticed it if he wasn't looking for something. Deciding it's probably important, he grabs it before heading back down to Ryan. 

"Think I found something of yours." Spencer says, waving the letter around.

Ryan looks at Spencer, sees the paper in his hand, and his brows furrow together as he holds out his hand for it. "Give me that, please," he asks, and when he sees his name on the envelope, his hands start shaking a bit. "Should-should I open it?" 

"Fucking duh? It's for you, Ryan, they left it on your pillow." Spencer smiles a little, glad to have found something to sort out this mystery. Ryan moves to open it, having to take a breath to calm his nerves. What could it say? What could it possibly fucking say that they couldn't tell him in person? That they had to (albeit temporarily, though they couldn't have known that much for sure) end his motherfucking life over?

At opening it, he finds its a letter from one of the scientists. Basically saying that, 'if you're reading this someone must have found you', and 'we did everything we could to keep the program running but others decided it was a waste of time and money', that 'shutting you down wasn't something we would have ever planned on' and 'funding was cut' and such. It also says that if he needs somewhere to stay, the scientist's family has been living in the same house for generations and to go there to see his son, or even grandson or great grandson at this point, and he'll be able to help him out. 

"What's it say?" Spencer asks, trying to read over his shoulder.

Ryan closes his eyes and takes a few deep breaths. Thirty years. Thirty years have gone by in the blink of an eye but at least he has some answers. He waits until he feels he can form a coherent response to Spencer to open his eyes again, but a tear or two manage to fall. "Long story short," he says finally. "Funding was cut. The- their higher ups didn't view me as a person. Just- just a machine. The scientists- at least a few of them who worked closest with me, got me my guitar and taught me and everything, they always told me I wasn't just some freaky robot, that they believed I outgrew their programming. But.. I guess their bosses disagreed." He sighs heavily before folding the paper back up. "But at least I might have a place to stay."

"That fuckin' sucks, man." Spencer frowns. "You look and act totally human to me. Despite coming from a different era, anyway." He sighs and pats his back. "Feel free to stay with me as long as you need, though. My parents won't mind." He slings the bag of clothes over his back. "Are you all set here or do you need anything else?"

"Just have to print a couple things-" Ryan presses a few buttons. No mouse, Spencer notices. Just keyboards. "And while those are printing, I'm going to grab a couple more things." He heads back up the stairs to his old room, grabs a few trinkets that are thankfully where he left them, a couple books, and a few folders of paper, shoving them in another bag and heading back downstairs to grab his guitar and the pages he printed. 

"What'd you have to print?"    
"Legal documents," Ryan says as he moves around. "Birth certificate, social security, shit like that. Changed a couple dates and I'm legally a citizen.”

"Just like that?" Spencer asks. 

"Just like that." Ryan smiles, putting the papers into a folder.    
"You could probably make us all fake ids pretty easily then can't you?" He asks, thinking Brendon would probably find that interesting. Just tell him that he's good at techy stuff. Not that he isn't human. He won't disclose that unless Ryan says that's okay. He isn't an asshole or anything.

"No fucking way, Spencer," Ryan laughs lightly. "Fake ID or not, none of us look old enough to be 18, let alone 21. Besides, an ID is something I can't make." Plus, they've probably changed in the last 30 years. He has confidence that his birth certificate will hold up, though. "Come on, let's get going," Ryan pulls the door to the tech room closed behind him, heading into an adjacent room and returning with a much newer looking lock. Still old, but it looks like it will hold up longer. "Gotta keep this safe." He locks the door and pockets the key. He's glad the spares were left behind. He's honestly glad he was left behind, instead of just scrapped.

"It was worth a shot." Spencer laughs a bit and claps him on his back. "All safe and shit now?" He figures that if Ryan needs anything else they can always just backtrack over here. 

When Ryan gives an affirmative answer, they head back out to see that Brendon is already starting to light up his second blunt.

"Couldn't wait for me, hunh?" Ryan laughs a bit. 

"You were taking fucking forever, thought maybe you died," Brendon smiles and takes a drag off the joint before holding it out for Ryan to take.

"It's good shit, don't worry about it." Spencer assures him with a grin. 

Ryan hesitates a moment before taking it from him. The scientists always made him stay away from drugs and cigarettes and certain medicines because they weren't sure how it would affect him, but Ryan figures it probably isn't a big deal. Brendon and Spencer seem to be just fine with it. He brings it to his mouth to take a drag of it.

Ryan doesn't feel anything at first, but it does make him cough, the smoke disagreeing with his lungs. 

"What do ya think?" Brendon grins at him expectantly. But Ryan doesn't really feel much. If it's supposed to mess with brain chemistry, maybe his isn't programmed to accept it? He might have to fix that once he hooks that up to modern technology. He did make sure to pack some patching cords, hopefully he can make it work.    


"Uh, wow, that's good shit," Ryan lies. "I'll um, I'll get used to it slowly." He doesn't plan on not smoking with his new friends, but maybe he'll let his lungs adjust to the inhalation over time, not all at once. He only just got turned on, after all.

Brendon nabs it back from him and takes a hit of it as he decides to start walking. "Off to Spin's house then?" He asks. 

"Guess so." Spencer answers.    


"How'd you convince your parents to let you stay home from church today, by the way?" Brent asks.    


Brendon coughs and puts a hand over his forehead. "I came down with a dreadful cold."

Ryan laughs a bit. "That good of an actor, hunh?" 

"Motherfucking Johnny Depp," Brendon grins as he flicks the ashes. "Like, I was soooo into it. Even you would've thought I was sick."    


"You _are_ sick," Brent laughs as he shoves Brendon off the sidewalk.    


"Yeah, sick in the head," Spencer adds on. Mental note, fill in Ryan on who Johnny Depp is.


	6. Chapter 6

They joke and overall get along pretty well on their way to Spencer's.    
Ryan is honestly amazed. He doesn't get any bit of the pop culture they're talking about, but they seem like cool guys to be around. Definitely different than the people he saw in the 60s.    
When they get to Spencer's, he shows Ryan to his room so he can make himself comfortable. "I know it's not really that high techy room that you were in for so long, but hopefully it does good enough." He grins at the android and pats his back before going to join the rest of his friends in the living room.

Ryan looks around before setting any of his things down. He doesn't know what half of this stuff is, but he can guess the stereo pretty well. There's no record player, though, which is certainly different. Only weird plastic rectangles and some plastic circles. There are books strewn about, school books by the looks of it, and drumsticks here and there. A couple broken. He ends up putting his stuff on Spencer's bed, for now, and decides it's probably best to go hang out with the guys until they leave.

When he finds his way to the living room, he sees the three of them all squished together on the couch, holding.. chunks of plastic in their hands?   
Spencer grins at Ryan and holds one out to him.    
"Did your super strict parents ever let you play n64?" Brendon asks. "Because I'm gonna own your asses at Mario party."

"N64?" Ryan accepts the plastic chunk, looking over to what he's guessing is a modern television. That's rather big, and clear. Nice. "Never heard of it," he admits.    


"Never heard of it??" Brendon's jaw practically hits the floor.    


"I was homeschooled, we didn't really have much," Ryan offers as he looks to how they're holding the plastic to try to copy it.    


"Here, I can help," Spencer gets up and makes Ryan sit in his spot. "You hold the controller like this, the middle stick is to move, and then the buttons are labeled A, B, Start, the yellow ones are the C buttons and they have all four directions, there's Z on the back, Left and Right at the top, and the Directional Pad on the left. You usually only have to use the middle and right side though, so don't worry about the D-Pad."

Ryan nods as he's told, taking all his tips to memory. They're probably important, and something he should know.    


"As for the game, it'll give you instructions for each thing, don't worry." Spencer tells him. "It's easy to learn."   


"Really restrictive parents if you haven't even heard of it." Brent says. "I would run away from home too."

Ryan just kind of shrugs, not in the mood to lie about his home life. "Let's just play," he says as he brings his attention to the screen.    
"You're Luigi, he's the green guy with the hat," Spencer points him out for him. "Basically it's a board game, but in a video game format."

Ryan nods again, figuring that makes sense. A virtual board game. Seems possible enough.    
Ryan manages to pick it up pretty quickly, not quite winning every game, but not in last.    
Spencer's mom comes home and he explains to her Ryan's situation about needing somewhere to stay for a day or two. She seems to be fine with it and offers to order everyone a pizza for dinner later. 

"Thanks again, Spencer," Ryan smiles at the human. He'll have to look for that scientist's family tomorrow, maybe they'll have better answers. Maybe he's still alive. 30 years isn't too long, is it?

They play for a while longer before Brendon gets bored of it, and he decides to ask Ryan more about himself. "How long have you played guitar, man? That thing looked fuckin' ancient. Was it a hand me down?"

Ryan holds back a snort when he thinks about telling him how old he is. "Just a couple years," he says. "My uncle gave it to me for Christmas." Lies. It was brand-fuckin-new and his best friend, or the scientist who came closest to the title, had gotten it for him. But. He supposes it's close enough to the truth.

"Does it even play anymore?" Brent asks, still not totally believing that something that looks that old can play a note. 

"It's just well loved." Brendon suggests with a grin. "Hand me downs aren't bad. It's better than just tossing something that has meaning into a dump."   


"That weed really has some effect on you, huh?" Spencer laughs.    


"Fuck you." Brendon frowns at him and flips him off.

"Dude be careful your mom's home, what the fuck?" Brent frowns at both of them. "She know you're a stoner?"    


Spencer's smile fades. "No, shit. Good point. Brendon, stop acting fucking high."    


"Can't stop acting when it's not acting," Brendon laughs and loses the minigame, focusing too much on the patterns of the butterfly wings than whether the pole they were sitting on was pointed or dull.

Ryan watches their interactions with each other, trying to understand modern speech patterns. They all seem to be great friends still even though they swear and yell at each other. Strange.    
After another round, Brendon gives up on the game, knowing he can't focus on it long enough to be any good. He decides to just watch their next round, hoping that the promised pizza will be on its way soon.

"Giving up just like that?" Ryan laughs a bit as he lands on a red space.    


"Yeah, man, can't fuckin' concentrate." Brendon replies as he holds out the controller for Spencer to take. "Here, you be Yoshi. I'm gonna go raid your fridge."

"I can't play two at once." Spencer laughs a bit but shakes his head. 

Brendon ends up coming back with a sandwich and like three bags of snacks.    
" You're sharing right?" Brent asks, reaching over to steal some chips.    


"Fuck no I found these, they're mine." Brendon frowns, moving the bag away from him before he can take them.

One thing Ryan notices is that like, almost everything is made of plastic. Plastic is everywhere, from the controller to the tv to their money and even to keeping their foods fresh. It's pretty interesting if he's being honest. "Hey, can I have a pretzel?" He asks, eyeing the bag of pretzels Brendon had brought with him. Maybe if he actually asks Brendon will give him some. He's not even that hungry, he just wants to find out.

Brendon eyes Ryan for a moment before turning the bag to him. "Fine, since you asked so nicely."   


Brent flips off Brendon but ends up losing the mini game at his distraction which just makes Brendon burst into laughter. "Serves you right, fucker."

Somehow, Ryan actually ends up winning the game. Which is totally unexpected, given that he's never so much as held a controller or seen a N64 before. But he's pretty proud of himself and eats a few pretzels in victory.

It isn't that much longer until Spencer's dad comes home, three boxes of pizza in hand. Yay!   


Spencer explains the Ryan thing to his dad, who also seems to be okay with Ryan spending a night or two, but reminds him that he has school tomorrow.    
"Oh that's right." Spencer turns to Ryan as everyone else is stuffing their faces. "School. Is that something you can get yourself in or?" Most 14 year old boys go to school. If he didn't, it would raise suspicion.

"Um," Ryan frowns a bit. "Maybe not tomorrow, but soon, probably." He has all of his legal documents, they're all dated correctly, he'll probably just need to find the scientist's family and hope that they can and are willing to sign off on caring for him.

"Alright cool. My parents leave early for work so you should be able to spend the day here while I'm gone too." Spencer says. "Make yourself at home, search some shit." He hands Ryan a plate of pizza before grabbing a slice for himself and following Brent and Brendon back to the living room to watch tv while they eat.

"Search some shit..?" Ryan wonders aloud. He still doesn't know what that means, but he'll ask later. There's Pizza and he wants to see what's on modern tv. "What are we watching?" He asks as he sits between Brendon and Spencer on the couch.

"Your pick." Brendon says, flipping between two shows indecisively. "Angry Beavers or Ed Edd n Eddy?" Because nickelodeon and cartoon network are honestly the only channels that matter, of course.    
Ryan looks to Spencer in vague confusion. A show about angry animals or three guys? That's what entertainment is?

"Um, Ed Edd and Eddy, I guess," Ryan decides once Spencer shrugs in his direction. He'll fill him in on shitty cartoons later. As Ryan watches he actually finds it kind of humorous, if incredibly weird. It's like stupid slapstick humor but he supposes it's relatable to kids in school and what not.

Once they finish their pizzas, Brent and Brendon know it's getting close to their curfew and decide on heading back home.    
Spencer ushers Ryan over to his room and sits him down at his computer to show him the wonders of the Internet. Although it's super slow but that's what you get with dial-up.

"So this is the Internet?" Ryan studies the display. There's a mouse, and you can click things with it, and the graphical display is far superior to his old machinery. Spencer lets him dick around for a bit, answering whatever questions he can and showing him how cool a search engine is. "There's so much information. That's incredible," Ryan smiles at him. "Let me see if..." He trails off as he moves to rummage through his bags to find where he put his files. After some finagling, he manages to get his files onto Spencer's computer, and from there onto a modern floppy disk. Wow. His program is relatively small compared to modern stuff.

Spencer does his best to explain how Internet and computers have evolved, then deciding to show him the beauty of AIM.    
"You make a screen name, and you add other's names and you can talk to them instantly." Spencer grins, clicking on a name and typing out a message.    


DrumDud345: hey bren :P did u get bustd 4 usng ur moms $$????   
  


XxB_UriexX: yea lol but i told her about Ryan and his pradicament and she said it was ok XD    


"Whoa, that's incredible," Ryan smiles wide. "Give me a few minutes with this later?" He wants to see if he can in fact get internet in his brain. If he can, maybe he can use AIM whenever he wants?

DrumDud345: hw do u get awy w evrthng?????   


"Take as much time with it as you need, man." Spencer rolls his chair to the side so Ryan can give it a shot to talk to Brendon. It's honestly so strange to introduce this stuff to someone who's supposed to be his age. He's used to explaining it to his parents but this is just strange.

XxB_UriexX: my innocent face :3 

Ryan exchanges a couple messages with Brendon before saying goodnight and logging off. "Spencer, this is gonna be totally weird to you, can you look through my bags and find a long purple cable?"    


Spencer raises an eyebrow but agrees, going through the various things and wires of Ryan's until he finds it. "What's it for?"    


"It looks like..." He takes it from his friend and inspects it a bit before moving and plugging one end into their modem. He then plugs the other side into what was previously the flesh of his upper arm, now autonomically exposed, Spencer can see where cables and cords of various sizes used to connect behind his skin. "See if I can use the Internet," he smirks at the human.

Seeing the cables on Ryan's arm really puts the whole thing in perspective. He really isn't human. At what point is he more robotic than human, he asks himself again. 

"That's fuckin sweet." Spencer says. "Might be a totally dumb question, probably is, but do you like, get damaged in the water?"

Ryan laughs a little. "If my arm is open like this and you poured water on it? Probably. Other than that, not really. Kind of need to shower like a normal person," he smiles at Spencer. His eyes seem to glow slightly from inside the cornea, like a cat's reflective lenses, as he works through his own code, integrating this technology to his system. He's actually pretty lucky that it's only been 30 years. Any longer and he might not have been able to update himself. He won't be able to use internet if he's not hooked up, but in the privacy of Spencer's computer room or perhaps in the privacy of the scientists family's home, he doesn't need a computer at least. Just a modem and a cord.


	7. Chapter 7

They joke and overall get along pretty well on their way to Spencer's.   
Ryan is honestly amazed. He doesn't get any bit of the pop culture they're talking about, but they seem like cool guys to be around. Definitely different than the people he saw in the 60s.   
When they get to Spencer's, he shows Ryan to his room so he can make himself comfortable. "I know it's not really that high techy room that you were in for so long, but hopefully it does good enough." He grins at the android and pats his back before going to join the rest of his friends in the living room.

 

Ryan looks around before setting any of his things down. He doesn't know what half of this stuff is, but he can guess the stereo pretty well. There's no record player, though, which is certainly different. Only weird plastic rectangles and some plastic circles. There are books strewn about, school books by the looks of it, and drumsticks here and there. A couple broken. He ends up putting his stuff on Spencer's bed, for now, and decides it's probably best to go hang out with the guys until they leave.

 

When he finds his way to the living room, he sees the three of them all squished together on the couch, holding.. chunks of plastic in their hands?  
Spencer grins at Ryan and holds one out to him.   
"Did your super strict parents ever let you play n64?" Brendon asks. "Because I'm gonna own your asses at Mario party."

 

"N64?" Ryan accepts the plastic chunk, looking over to what he's guessing is a modern television. That's rather big, and clear. Nice. "Never heard of it," he admits.   
"Never heard of it??" Brendon's jaw practically hits the floor.   
"I was homeschooled, we didn't really have much," Ryan offers as he looks to how they're holding the plastic to try to copy it.   
"Here, I can help," Spencer gets up and makes Ryan sit in his spot. "You hold the controller like this, the middle stick is to move, and then the buttons are labeled A, B, Start, the yellow ones are the C buttons and they have all four directions, there's Z on the back, Left and Right at the top, and the Directional Pad on the left. You usually only have to use the middle and right side though, so don't worry about the D-Pad."

 

Ryan nods as he's told, taking all his tips to memory. They're probably important, and something he should know.   
"As for the game, it'll give you instructions for each thing, don't worry." Spencer tells him. "It's easy to learn."   
"Really restrictive parents if you haven't even heard of it." Brent says. "I would run away from home too."

 

Ryan just kind of shrugs, not in the mood to lie about his home life. "Let's just play," he says as he brings his attention to the screen.   
"You're Luigi, he's the green guy with the hat," Spencer points him out for him. "Basically it's a board game, but in a video game format."

 

Ryan nods again, figuring that makes sense. A virtual board game. Seems possible enough.   
Ryan manages to pick it up pretty quickly, not quite winning every game, but not in last.   
Spencer's mom comes home and he explains to her Ryan's situation about needing somewhere to stay for a day or two. She seems to be fine with it and offers to order everyone a pizza for dinner later.

 

"Thanks again, Spencer," Ryan smiles at the human. He'll have to look for that scientist's family tomorrow, maybe they'll have better answers. Maybe he's still alive. 30 years isn't too long, is it?

They play for a while longer before Brendon gets bored of it, and he decides to ask Ryan more about himself. "How long have you played guitar, man? That thing looked fuckin' ancient. Was it a hand me down?"

Ryan holds back a snort when he thinks about telling him how old he is. "Just a couple years," he says. "My uncle gave it to me for Christmas." Lies. It was brand-fuckin-new and his best friend, or the scientist who came closest to the title, had gotten it for him. But. He supposes it's close enough to the truth.

"Does it even play anymore?" Brent asks, still not totally believing that something that looks that old can play a note. 

"It's just well loved." Brendon suggests with a grin. "Hand me downs aren't bad. It's better than just tossing something that has meaning into a dump."

"That weed really has some effect on you, huh?" Spencer laughs. 

"Fuck you." Brendon frowns at him and flips him off.

"Dude be careful your mom's home, what the fuck?" Brent frowns at both of them. "She know you're a stoner?" 

Spencer's smile fades. "No, shit. Good point. Brendon, stop acting fucking high." 

"Can't stop acting when it's not acting," Brendon laughs and loses the minigame, focusing too much on the patterns of the butterfly wings than whether the pole they were sitting on was pointed or dull.

Ryan watches their interactions with each other, trying to understand modern speech patterns. They all seem to be great friends still even though they swear and yell at each other. Strange.   
After another round, Brendon gives up on the game, knowing he can't focus on it long enough to be any good. He decides to just watch their next round, hoping that the promised pizza will be on its way soon.

"Giving up just like that?" Ryan laughs a bit as he lands on a red space. 

"Yeah, man, can't fuckin' concentrate." Brendon replies as he holds out the controller for Spencer to take. "Here, you be Yoshi. I'm gonna go raid your fridge."

"I can't play two at once." Spencer laughs a bit but shakes his head. 

Brendon ends up coming back with a sandwich and like three bags of snacks.   
" You're sharing right?" Brent asks, reaching over to steal some chips. 

"Fuck no I found these, they're mine." Brendon frowns, moving the bag away from him before he can take them.

One thing Ryan notices is that like, almost everything is made of plastic. Plastic is everywhere, from the controller to the tv to their money and even to keeping their foods fresh. It's pretty interesting if he's being honest. "Hey, can I have a pretzel?" He asks, eyeing the bag of pretzels Brendon had brought with him. Maybe if he actually asks Brendon will give him some. He's not even that hungry, he just wants to find out.

Brendon eyes Ryan for a moment before turning the bag to him. "Fine, since you asked so nicely."

Brent flips off Brendon but ends up losing the mini game at his distraction which just makes Brendon burst into laughter. "Serves you right, fucker."

Somehow, Ryan actually ends up winning the game. Which is totally unexpected, given that he's never so much as held a controller or seen a N64 before. But he's pretty proud of himself and eats a few pretzels in victory.

It isn't that much longer until Spencer's dad comes home, three boxes of pizza in hand. Yay!

Spencer explains the Ryan thing to his dad, who also seems to be okay with Ryan spending a night or two, but reminds him that he has school tomorrow.   
"Oh that's right." Spencer turns to Ryan as everyone else is stuffing their faces. "School. Is that something you can get yourself in or?" Most 14 year old boys go to school. If he didn't, it would raise suspicion.

"Um," Ryan frowns a bit. "Maybe not tomorrow, but soon, probably." He has all of his legal documents, they're all dated correctly, he'll probably just need to find the scientist's family and hope that they can and are willing to sign off on caring for him.

"Alright cool. My parents leave early for work so you should be able to spend the day here while I'm gone too." Spencer says. "Make yourself at home, search some shit." He hands Ryan a plate of pizza before grabbing a slice for himself and following Brent and Brendon back to the living room to watch tv while they eat.

"Search some shit..?" Ryan wonders aloud. He still doesn't know what that means, but he'll ask later. There's Pizza and he wants to see what's on modern tv. "What are we watching?" He asks as he sits between Brendon and Spencer on the couch.

"Your pick." Brendon says, flipping between two shows indecisively. "Angry Beavers or Ed Edd n Eddy?" Because nickelodeon and cartoon network are honestly the only channels that matter, of course.   
Ryan looks to Spencer in vague confusion. A show about angry animals or three guys? That's what entertainment is?

"Um, Ed Edd and Eddy, I guess," Ryan decides once Spencer shrugs in his direction. He'll fill him in on shitty cartoons later. As Ryan watches he actually finds it kind of humorous, if incredibly weird. It's like stupid slapstick humor but he supposes it's relatable to kids in school and what not.

Once they finish their pizzas, Brent and Brendon know it's getting close to their curfew and decide on heading back home.   
Spencer ushers Ryan over to his room and sits him down at his computer to show him the wonders of the Internet. Although it's super slow but that's what you get with dial-up.

"So this is the Internet?" Ryan studies the display. There's a mouse, and you can click things with it, and the graphical display is far superior to his old machinery. Spencer lets him dick around for a bit, answering whatever questions he can and showing him how cool a search engine is. "There's so much information. That's incredible," Ryan smiles at him. "Let me see if..." He trails off as he moves to rummage through his bags to find where he put his files. After some finagling, he manages to get his files onto Spencer's computer, and from there onto a modern floppy disk. Wow. His program is relatively small compared to modern stuff.

Spencer does his best to explain how Internet and computers have evolved, then deciding to show him the beauty of AIM.   
"You make a screen name, and you add other's names and you can talk to them instantly." Spencer grins, clicking on a name and typing out a message. 

DrumDud345: hey bren :) did u get bustd 4 usng ur moms $$????   
  


XxB_UriexX: yea lol but i told her about Ryan and his pradicament and she said it was ok XD    
"Whoa, that's incredible," Ryan smiles wide. "Give me a few minutes with this later?" He wants to see if he can in fact get internet in his brain. If he can, maybe he can use AIM whenever he wants?

DrumDud345: hw do u get awy w evrthng?????   
"Take as much time with it as you need, man." Spencer rolls his chair to the side so Ryan can give it a shot to talk to Brendon. It's honestly so strange to introduce this stuff to someone who's supposed to be his age. He's used to explaining it to his parents but this is just strange.

XxB_UriexX: my innocent face :3    
Ryan exchanges a couple messages with Brendon before saying goodnight and logging off. "Spencer, this is gonna be totally weird to you, can you look through my bags and find a long purple cable?"    
Spencer raises an eyebrow but agrees, going through the various things and wires of Ryan's until he finds it. "What's it for?"    
"It looks like..." He takes it from his friend and inspects it a bit before moving and plugging one end into their modem. He then plugs the other side into what was previously the flesh of his upper arm, now autonomically exposed, Spencer can see where cables and cords of various sizes used to connect behind his skin. "See if I can use the Internet," he smirks at the human.

Seeing the cables on Ryan's arm really puts the whole thing in perspective. He really isn't human. At what point is he more robotic than human, he asks himself again. 

"That's fuckin sweet." Spencer says. "Might be a totally dumb question, probably is, but do you like, get damaged in the water?"

Ryan laughs a little. "If my arm is open like this and you poured water on it? Probably. Other than that, not really. Kind of need to shower like a normal person," he smiles at Spencer. His eyes seem to glow slightly from inside the cornea, like a cat's reflective lenses, as he works through his own code, integrating this technology to his system. He's actually pretty lucky that it's only been 30 years. Any longer and he might not have been able to update himself. He won't be able to use internet if he's not hooked up, but in the privacy of Spencer's computer room or perhaps in the privacy of the scientists family's home, he doesn't need a computer at least. Just a modem and a cord.


	8. Chapter 8

Spencer gets up to grab something from his closet, coming back with an armful of pillows and blankets. He sets down a bunch of the pillows before covering them with a light blanket. "Makeshift bed. Not too shabby hm?" He laughs a bit and covers it with another blanket. "Bren's idea for whenever he spends the night." After he sets it up he turns his attention back to Ryan. "So can you have like instant access to Yahoo and shit?"

"Looks pretty comfortable actually," Ryan laughs. "As long as I'm hooked up like this, yeah," he answers. "I'm a bit faster than your computer is, too." He's thankful for Spencer's hospitality, honestly. His first friend's turning out to be a pretty awesome guy.

"Shit that's cool." Spencer laughs again and gets himself comfortable on his own bed, pulling out his gameboy to keep him occupied until Ryan is finished. "Also I'm pretty sure I packed you some pajamas in that bag." He says. "Old as fuck looking though. Make sure that other family takes you shopping, man."

"Being asleep for thirty years will do that," Ryan laughs softly. He sighs as he returns to his work, trying not to think about everything he's missed out on. Thirty years. He thinks about looking up the Beatles, but something about what Spencer's been saying is keeping him from doing that. He doesn't want it to be true. They can't have split up. They just can't.

Spencer looks back to Ryan when he hears him being quiet for a while. "Everything okay?" He asks, sitting back up. "I know it's a shit load of stuff to catch up on. If you need my help at all let me know." Although the Internet can probably explain things better than he can.

"I'm just- uh, I'm not sure if I'm ready to hear about some of this stuff. You know?" Ryan confides quietly and gives a weak laugh. "I mean, everything I knew was ripped from me, and now I'm here." It's scary. He doesn't have any of his old comforts. Well. He does have one. He's quiet for a while before starting to look something up. "Can you hand me my guitar?" He asks as Spencer gladly grabs it and gives it to him. Ryan tunes it with an online tuner and thinks about what to play. He eventually settles on Penny Lane, just kind of wanting a distraction from it all.

"If you do need help at all, I'll be here, man." Spencer decides to leave it at that, knowing that it must be a lot to take in. Coming from a world that was thirty years in the past to now? It can't be easy. He couldn't imagine such a thing.  His guitar playing is honestly pretty good. Pretty calming. He thinks that Brendon and Brent would probably enjoy it too.

Ryan sings along to himself a little before stopping and looking to Spencer. "You said you played drums, didn't you? And you wanted to show me some music?"

"Oh, yeah, I do. Drum set right over there." Spencer motions over to the corner of his room. "My parents say I should move it to the basement, but we'll see." Spencer says, sitting up and hopping off his bed to go to his CD player. He takes a disc out and puts another in. "Blink is fantastic, you'll love them." He grins as he presses the play button, then heads back over to his bed as he relaxes again.

Ryan tries to have an open mind as he listens to the music, but it still is strikingly different from everything he used to listen to. He focuses instead on each individual part of the song, the bass, the guitar, each separate harmony, and feels much more at ease as he dissects it in his mind. Music is a language, a science, and an art, and Ryan's deciding he really likes Blink-182.

"They're a lot different from the Beatles, but music is music." Spencer shrugs. "And it's good music." He gets up after a few songs and grabs some albums from his shelf, handing them over to Ryan. "I've got Green Day, Jimmy Eat World, The Offspring, Weezer." He lists off as he hands the albums to Ryan. "Take your pick, man."

"Uh," Ryan laughs as he looks over the albums- the CDs, apparently- in his hands. "I don't even know where to start." He smiles at Spencer. "Why not.. This one?" He picks out Weezer's disc and hands it to Spencer.

"Sweet. Great choice." Spencer laughs as he puts that in the player. "But I would've said that to any you chose." He laughs again and decides to go change into pajamas while Ryan catches up with more modern music. Someone's gotta make sure he listens to the right stuff.

The guitar parts sound pretty different from what he's used to, but he can hear some things that sound familiar, and the songs are pretty damn good. He takes a deep breath. Maybe he can handle whatever news there is about the Beatles. He waits until Spencer's situated back in his seat though, needing a friend nearby if his fears are true.

Once he's done changing, he hops back in his bed, totally comfy. Spencer considers skipping school tomorrow to be sure that Ryan is situated, but he doesn't need to give his parents a reason to look into Ryan's situation. Ryan can handle some time on his own, Spencer thinks. "Still doing okay?"

"Yeah, I think so," Ryan gives him a light smile, which falters momentarily. "Um, what you said about the Beatles. Did- did they really break up?" Please don't be true, he thinks, but he knows that it probably is. He doesn't want to believe it, doesn't want it to be real. But if that was Spencer's initial reaction the first time, then... It probably is.

Spencer nods slightly. "They broke up roughly around the time you were shut off." He says, trying not to sound disinterested about the subject. This band really meant a lot to Ryan. He hesitates for a moment before continuing. "John Lennon died about ten years after that."

"Died...?" Ryan frowns. They were still pretty young, he shouldn't have died.. He sighs and shuts his eyes in an attempt to hold back tears, but a few fall nonetheless. He doesn't know what else to say, doesn't want to know what happened to the other three. Not right now. "That's... That's life, I suppose," he says after a few minutes. Then, under his breath, nothing more than, "fuck."

Spencer gets up from his bed to get over and hug him, his oh so fragile masculinity be damned. His new friend is upset and he wants to be sure he's okay. "The others are still alive. They're okay." He reassures him.

It takes Ryan a little bit, but he does hug Spencer back. Thankful he has at least one thing, one person that gives a damn about him. "Thanks," he says quietly before loosening his grip around Spencer. "Not just for- for this. For everything so far." Who knows what would have happened if someone else had found him? If someone else would have ever found him.

"Of course, dude. What are friends for?" He smiles and lets go of him to head back to his bed. At least he didn't like, overload or go all crazy robot. Is that something that can happen? Spencer decides against asking. Ryan definitely seems more human than robot. "I'm gonna try getting some rest, I leave for school at around 8." He says.

"Yeah," Ryan does his best to snap out of it. "Yeah, go ahead. I'm just gonna get changed and, uh, and rest myself," he sniffles a bit as he goes to put on his pajamas.  When he's all set he looks to Spencer. "Your parents won't see if I hook myself up overnight, will they?" He doesn't really want to freak out Spencer's family. Not since they're being so nice to him. But he wants to download some information and have time to review it in his sleep, so he's at least a bit more educated on modern shit.

"Nah they don't come in my room without knocking and waiting for an okay." Spencer assures him. He honestly loves his parents a ton. They're always super understanding.    
He gets under the covers and makes himself comfortable after setting his alarm clock. It doesn't take much longer after that for him to end up drifting off.

  
"Thanks again, Spencer, for everything," Ryan repeats as he moves so the cord can reach from the computer to his arm. "If you need to wake me up, just tell me to wake up. I should hear you," he informs him before setting his internal alarm to 7 and letting himself get some rest.


	9. Chapter 9

Spencer's alarm goes off at 7:15, and his arm just knocks the clock off his table and he groans loudly. He crawls out of his bed to grab the clock and shut it off. "You awake, Ry?" He asks as he sets the clock back on the table. Spencer really doesn't want to head to school today, ugh.

Unbeknownst to Spencer, Ryan's already awake and in the bathroom, making himself look decent for when he shows up to what will hopefully be his new home.

Spencer frowns, wondering where Ryan went off to. He decides to use this time to get dressed though, figuring he might as well before Ryan shows back up. Unless he just vanished during the night or something. Hopefully he didn't. That would be bad.

"Morning Spencer," Ryan smiles softly at him when he returns to his room.    


"Hey, thought maybe you took off in the middle of the night or something," Spencer laughs as he collects his school books into his backpack.    


"Sorry," Ryan laughs lightly. "Still here, unfortunately."

"Hey um." Spencer thinks for a moment. "If everything goes well with that family, you can still always come and visit whenever you want, okay?" He's sure that his parents won't mind Ryan coming to drop by whenever. "You're my friend, alright?"

Ryan smiles at him. "Thanks. You'll regret that," he laughs as he packs his stuff into his two small bags. "Their home is in your school district."

"No shit? That's good, great." Spencer grins, glad that this means it won't be the last time they're seeing each other. "Oh, hang on a second." Spencer heads back to his room for a minute and comes back with a piece of paper, handing it to Ryan. "Um, phone numbers and screen names for me Bren and Brent." He says. "Figure you might want it, just in case or something."

"Sweet, thanks," Ryan gladly takes and folds the paper, putting it in his pocket. "So I'll message you after school if I can?" Hopefully this family will let him use their broadband. If they'll even let him stay.

"You can just message whenever and I'll get it when I get online." Spencer says with a smile. "And if it doesn't work out for whatever reason, feel free to come back here. My parents won't mind you staying longer until we figure it all out." He just wants his new friend to get along well in life.

"Far out," Ryan laughs. He knows that's dated now, but he doesn't care. "Have a good time at school, then, Spin, I'm headed out." He grabs his bags and guitar, heading for the door to find this scientist's family. The scientist he was named after. The Ross family.

It does take a little while of wandering around for him to finally find the house in question. Will they even be home? Will they accept him? Do they even know what he is? He takes a deep breath before knocking on the door and honestly hoping for the best here.

After a bit of standing around, a man opens the door, t shirt and lounge pants, a bit of a stain on the front of his shirt. His hair's a bit of a mess and his face is unshaven and he looks kind of cranky, but not altogether unpleasant. Just kind of, disheveled? "Yes?" He asks, voice tired. "I'm, um, I'm Ryan, is this the Ross residence..?" Ryan asks, a little worried he'll be outright rejected. He doesn't really want to be homeless.

"Yeah, who's asking?" He says. "Don't want Girl Scout cookies, kid." He goes to close the door but Ryan stops him. 

"I'm-um-"   


"What do you want?"   


"Is your, um, is your father Ryan Ross?" He asks. He was oh so cleverly named after the scientist. So smart. Wonderful choice in name.   
Honestly he didn't mind being named after the head scientist. Made him feel like he was part of his family.

"George Ross," he frowns a bit. "But he sometimes went by Ryan, yeah. Why? You a fan or something? He's dead, kid."    


"No, he- he built me," Ryan says, hopeful. "Left me instructions to come here if.. If I was ever reactivated."

"Built you? Shit, I knew that guy was crazy." He sighs and steps aside to let him inside. "What'd you say? You're named Ryan too?" He frowns and heads off to another area of the house. Ryan stands there awkwardly after closing the door, hearing some clanging about. About a minute later he returns with what looks like a binder of papers. "He said it was unlikely you'd come back." He flips through the papers. "Biorobotic android or some shit yeah?"

"Y-yeah," Ryan's honestly totally intimidated by this guy. "Mostly human, part robotic," he goes to explain, but the guy just waves him off as he flips through things.    


"Don't really care, as long as you eat and sleep and all that normal shit." He sighs again as he opens the binder to a folder starting with "2000."

Ryan clutches his bag a bit tighter, feeling totally unsure about this place. The guy doesn't at all seem like how Spencer's parents act. He honestly considers hightailing it back to Spencer's and just see if his parents would take him in, but he doesn't want to be a burden to them. "Is... Is he really dead?" Ryan asks quietly as the other is flipping through papers and such. Even if he was put into a senior home or something, honestly seeing the head scientist again and having him assure him that his son will take good care of him would put him a bit more at ease. The home reeks of alcohol.

"Unfortunately. Heart attack about 10 years ago," his voice is quiet. "Sorry. I forget you actually knew him pretty well. Spent more time in that damn place than with his family until they shut it down." He frowns and looks up at Ryan briefly. "No offense to you, kid." Disagreeable as he may be, he's not heartless. He won't turn the kid out on the streets. And the tech is definitely too important to give to the government. 

"Um, none taken," Ryan replies quietly.    


"Here we go, documents for you for this year. My old man wrote up a bunch for like, 50 years from when you got shut off. Cared about you a hell of a lot. Never did nothin' like this for us," he says a bit gruffly. "Though I s'pose we didn't need none of this."

"Thanks. Um, thanks a lot." Ryan says, taking the papers that are handed to him. 

The man, his father?, gestures for him to follow him. He leads him to a room up the stairs. It's kinda shabby looking, but it's a room all his own. And there's a computer there too, at least.  "It's something at least." He huffs. "It hasn't been used in years, so it's a craphole but it's something."   


"Thanks, really." Ryan speaks up. "I know it's short notice. It's really helpful."

"So guess that makes you an official Ross now, hm?" The man gives him a small smile. "George Ryan Ross the third," he says. "I'll call the school, tell them I'm enrolling you," he sighs and turns to leave Ryan to unpacking his things. "We'll get you some modern stuff tonight. Clothes and shit. Your, uh, grandfather left you a sum of money in the safe, said he programmed the combination into your memory." He doesn't dislike this kid, isn't opposed to the idea of being a father. He's just not really the paternal type or anything. He might have a bit of a drinking problem since his wife left him, but he'll do his best for the kid. Or something.

"Thanks." Ryan says again, managing a small smile back after setting his few belongings down on the bed. 

His new father eyes the guitar for a moment. "If you're going to be playing that, keep it down." He says. "But aside from that, welcome home." He gives a vague shrug before heading back down the stairs to go and get Ryan in a school situation before he forgets to.    


The place is far from perfect, but he was right. It's at least something. Better than that decrepit old place he was in for thirty years.

The first thing Ryan does is test the Internet. He finds the modem with little trouble and hooks himself up. It seems better than Spencer's, despite the computer being old. He makes himself an AIM account and adds all of the guys to his friends list, opening a chat up to Spencer. 

GRR_v3: Hey Spin   


GRR_v3: Got internet :)   


GRR_v3: Going to get situated here and rest until you get on   


GRR_v3: do some research

There obviously isn't an answer from Spencer, so he doesn't keep bombarding him with messages. This tech is definitely better than back in the 60s, that's for certain.    
He shoots over messages to Brent and Brendon as well so they know it's him, and he gets almost an immediate answer from Brendon.    


XxB_UriexX: about time ur parents got u up 2 date on the intenets XD   


XxB_UriexX: o yeah im totlly and horribly sick & couldnt go 2 skool wht a shame rite? :(((   


XxB_UriexX: ;)   


GRR_v3: Somehow i doubt that hahaha   


XxB_UriexX: :( U calling me a liar pal?    


XxB_UriexX: u kno i couldnt go 2 church yestrdy bcuz i was sick :(

GRR_v3: it's cause your parents are chumps   


XxB_UriexX: >:( they r not   


GRR_v3: you're the chumpiest    


XxB_UriexX: fuk u Ry   


XxB_UriexX: anyway mom n dad don't get home til 530   


XxB_UriexX: wanna hang?

Ryan gives it some thought. He could work on updating to understand more pop culture references, but one of his friends wants to hang out with him. Friend. He actually has friends that he's supposed to be the same age as. Honestly that's such a strange concept to him. And he definitely doesn't want to ruin that.    


GRR_v3: I suppose if I have to :P   


XxB_UriexX: yea u hav to

XxB_UriexX: meet u @ tht creepy house u were at?   


XxB_UriexX: then we can prolly head 2 the mall or some shit XD

GRR_v3: yeah sure haha   


GRR_v3: mall sounds good. Need to go shopping anyway.    


GRR_v3: I'll head over now then   


XxB_UriexX: c u thre :)    


Ryan smiles a little and disconnects himself, feeling kind of good about things right now. All things considered, anyway. He heads over to the small safe in the corner of the room, and as he goes to put his hand on the dial, he finds he already knows exactly where to turn it. Grandpa Ross didn't lie, he totally programmed the combination into Ryan's head. Inside is actually just cash, like, normal cash. Ryan checks the dates on the bills and finds they're no more than 15 years old, but finds about $100 in bills from the mid 90s as well. It wasn't just Grandpa Ross, then. His, uh, dad must have also been saving money for him. Or maybe just exchanging bills to keep it current. He wouldn't be surprised either way.  Once he gathers up the money, he makes his way down the stairs. "I'm going to be going out with a friend." He says as he peeks his head in the living room.    


His father just sort of waves him off. "Be back before dark."   
Ryan nods and hurries on off to where Brendon said to meet on up.


	10. Chapter 10

Ryan ends up getting there before Brendon does, so he waits around on the lawn until he sees him turn the corner. He stands and goes to greet him, kind of excited about this. Hanging out with a friend. Going to the mall. Shopping. For himself. Without scientists deciding what to get. Part of him really wants to tell Brendon everything, so he can be excited for him too, but he doesn't want to push his luck. He might not understand or accept him or he might totally freak out or something.  If he does decide to tell him, maybe he should wait until Brendon is high as fuck.    


"Yo!" Brendon grins and waves at him. When Ryan comes over to him, he holds his hands out. "Watch out. Very sick. Super contagious." He says with a laugh before clapping him on the back. "Work things out with your family?"

"Uh, something like that," Ryan laughs. "Not gonna be homeschooled anymore," he says with a smirk. "So basically I need to go shopping. Get out of these, uh, hand-me-downs." He likes his clothes, but he can't go around wearing clothes from the 60s, as much as he would like to.

"I can help you with that." Brendon grins again and grabs his wrist to usher him off to the nearby mall. Good thing about living in Vegas is that there's always places to shop around the corner. They make their way to the mall and Brendon instantly wants to go to the video game store, but he tells himself that Ryan definitely needs new clothes first. Then he can shop for himself. Ryan's trying not to overload from all the lights and holy shit this is a mall in 2000? He honestly doesn't even know where to start and he doesn't know if he can confide in Brendon enough to get his help. He's got to either tell the guy the truth or come up with a pretty convincing lie about why he doesn't even know what these stores are.

"So what kind of places do you like to shop?" Brendon asks. "Because we should choose the opposite of that so you don't look like you walked out of a time machine or some shit." He laughs a bit. "And I don't think you have a Delorean that could do that."

These references still totally go over Ryan's head. Maybe he should have waited for Spencer to come back from school to use as a buffer for the decade difference.. It would probably be easier to tell Brendon everything, he is his friend after all, but he was lucky enough for Spencer to understand. He might not be so lucky with Brendon.

"Uh, honestly? I'm pretty hungry. Let's get food first," he offers. If he's going to try to explain things, he's going to do it over food. Everything's easier over a good meal. "My treat," Ryan adds. 

"Fuck, yeah! Let's get like, Wendy's or something!" Brendon will always jump at the chance to get shitty fast food. Especially when someone else is paying.

Ryan laughs a bit at Brendon's enthusiasm and follows him to the food court area, and Brendon makes a bee-line straight for Wendy's to wait in line. 

Ryan glances around, seeing that food hasn't really changed that much. It just looks like a lot of it has become easier to access than just homemade things. Seems like within these few decades, people want things instantly.    


Brendon orders some spicy chicken nuggets, and Ryan figures to order the same thing, handing the cashier the money as the cashier gives them cups to go fill.

Ryan of course goes for the coke, and fountain drinks like that are so cool whoa. Brendon gets root beer, and then when they get their order they go sit at a small table. "You look like you've never been in a mall before, dude," Brendon points out as he cracks open his nuggets. Hell yes.

"It's... It's been a while." Ryan says, taking a bite of one of the French fries, then deciding it needs ketchup and going to go grab some before he gets into any lengthy discussion.    


"Man, I think your parents might be stricter than mine. Were they the kind of people who were afraid of that y2k virus shit?" Brendon asks, stuffing his face with chicken.    


The what?

Brendon sees the look on Ryan's face. "You know, like, 'all of the computers are gonna die because they only go up to 1999' scare." 

Ryan just kind of frowns at him. "I didn't-"    


"It was all over the news, Ry, fuck, you been living in a hole in the ground or something?" He's genuinely concerned, if he's being honest. What if his parents like, kept him hidden cause they're some weird cult or something? What if they've like, abused him or some shit? He knows his family's own religion gets a bad rep, but damn.

"No, I-" Ryan sighs, trying to go about it in a way that won't make Brendon freak out. Brendon definitely seems like he'd freak out at everything though. 

"Because if your parents are still putting you through shit then I'm just gonna take you back to my place and you can stay there."   


"No, it-it isn't that, really." He takes another breath. "I just... Um, I haven't been awake in thirty years."

Brendon frowns a bit. "What?" What does that even mean? Some weird medical coma?

"I haven't.. I've been asleep since July 23rd, 1970," he says a bit quietly. "I woke up.. No, I was reactivated when Spencer stayed the night in that house." He looks away, not quite ready for whatever reaction Brendon is going to give him. Laughing, disbelief, anger, whatever it is, he doesn't want to see it.

Brendon stares him down for a moment before taking another bite of a French fry. "1970? Reactivated?" He asks, still staring at him. That doesn't make sense. He isn't a fuckin' robot. Robots are mechanical and shit. Maybe he got his hands on some weed of his own or something worse. Maybe he has some leftover.

Ryan looks back at him before moving to open his arm briefly so only Brendon can see where he can be hooked up. Thankfully it's midday on a Monday so not many people are around anyway. "Android," he says quietly. "Biorobotic, more human than machine," he sighs and closes the cord port. "I was an experiment, and then I was deactivated." He looks away again, down this time, feeling kinda shitty. He misses his old life. He actually enjoyed it quite a bit, and he can't even say goodbye to the only real father figure he had growing up. He's just gone. Forever.

Brendon keeps studying him for a while longer. "Android." He repeats, a bit less of a question and more just to try and make himself understand. He saw the wires, and it would make sense as to why he doesn't understand anything. "Android..." He absentmindedly keeps eating his fries. "Kay..."

"Still pretty damn normal," Ryan offers with a light and nervous laugh, going to eat his own fries. "Just.. No parents. Kind of." 

"And the whole robotic thing," Brendon adds as he munches down a nugget.    


"You're not just.. Gonna like, take off?" Ryan asks with an eyebrow raised in skepticism. "Call police or something?"

"Yeah, lemme go find the police. A kid who's supposed to be in school right now, going to the police." He laughs a bit and shakes his head. "Don't worry about it, dude." The way Brendon sees it, as long as he isn't gonna go psycho robocop on him, he's still the same guy he met yesterday.

Is everyone this understanding in the 21st century? Ryan can't imagine adults would be as open to the idea of him being an android as Brendon and Spencer are, but still.. "Seriously," Ryan still can't believe his luck. "A 14 year old android straight out of the 60s and you're totally cool with it?" He eats his chicken nuggets a little more comfortably, finding he's actually pretty hungry. And they're pretty good. Shitty, but like, a good shitty.

"It's cool as shit, Ryan." Brendon laughs. "My new friend is actually a robot. Or, android rather." He shrugs. "It's cool as shit." He says again. 

So he's seriously okay with it? Not gonna be hunted down and torn apart or something?

"That out of the way," Ryan smiles a little. "I don't normally shop anywhere here," he laughs. "And I need to not look decades old. Apparently I start school in a few days or so." Maybe even tomorrow. He'll have to ask Spencer if their music program's any good. "Help me survive?"

"I got you man, don't worry." Brendon says, stuffing a handful of fries in his mouth. "I gnow frsshon." He says with his mouth full, giving him a thumbs up. Ryan's a blank slate when it comes to fashion and Brendon will make sure he looks The Coolest™.

"I'm sure you do," Ryan laughs as he finishes up his fries. "Still want to have my own personal style though, Brendon. Just lead me in the right direction." He still can't believe his luck. He has friends. And two of them know what he is and they don't even give a shit. Like seriously, what the fuck kind of world did he wake up in? "You really like, seriously do not give a shit that I'm literally 30 years older than you, though?" He asks with a smirk.

"I'm being good and volunteering my time to the elderly." Brendon grins, gathering up all their garbage. "After I help you shop, do you need help crossing a street? Or getting your cat outta a tree?" He jokes, tossing the bag in the garbage. "I won't force you to buy anything you wouldn't wear." Brendon assures him.

Ryan walks up next to him and bumps their shoulders together. "You're a dick," he laughs. 

"I'm a fucking helpful dick, thank you," Brendon bumps him back. "Besides, dick is great, what's wrong with dick?" He says as he laughs, but totally serious.

Ryan gives a shrug, deciding against answering that. He was never programmed with a certain preference for men or women, so he doesn't really dwell on it much. 

"And here we are." Brendon says, extending his arms out to present the store in front of them. "Old Navy has good shit that's usually pretty cheap. I'm not gonna force you to go to like Macy's or shit. Their teens clothes are always complete crap."

"Jeans are so small," Ryan observed as they go inside and look at the clothes. "I mean, they're not, but like, they're all straight leg."

"So?" Brendon raises an eyebrow. Then remembers. 60s. Right.    


"Just weird to me. Don't forget that in my mind, 1970 was literally two days ago. Everything's different as hell." He laughs and wanders through the racks of clothes, picking out a few things here and there he actually really likes, getting pointers from Brendon, and occasionally having Brendon get things for him to wear because honestly he has no idea what would look good.

Brendon grabs him a few simple generic graphic tees, shoving them in his arms before he heads to the dressing room. "Make sure you show me everything you try on!" Brendon calls out to him, wanting to be sure the things he chose actually look somewhat decent together.

"Yeah, yeah," Ryan smiles to himself. He ends up actually kind of liking modern pants, and they're more comfortable than his old stuff too. It's more subdued than what he's used to, less flashy. Which is fine. He doesn't want to stand out, really. On the plus side, his messy head of hair actually seems to be relatively in style. So that's good too. He makes sure to show Brendon every article of clothing, getting his approval or disapproval as he sees fit. And after a while of approving and disapproving, Ryan finally gets the final verdict of four pairs of jeans, five simple tee-shirts, and two dressier looking button up shirts. Brendon tried to convince him no floral but he seemed adamant about it so he didn't argue with it.

"Still need something," Ryan tells Brendon as he pays the cashier.    


"What's that? Beside like, shoes or whatever?"    


"Yeah. Band shirts. You guys have some right? They're kind of popular?"    


Brendon smiles and pulls at his wrist again, bringing him to the entrance of a kind of scary looking store. "Hot Topic."

"Alright..." Ryan eyes the store a bit suspiciously as Brendon drags him on in, waving at the cashier as he walks in and leads him right over to the band merch. 

"Definitely get some Blink." Brendon advises. "Spin showed you some music right? He'd be an idiot not to have."   
He realizes he's lost Ryan's attention as he's now holding up a Beatles shirt with a big grin.

"They have a Beatles shirt," Ryan smiles wide at his friend. "I know you probably don't give a shit but like.." He actually has to steel his nerves a bit, finding himself get a little emotional. "They were still together when I was shut down. I.. I just found out about their breakup yesterday." And to see they're selling Beatles merch in the year 2000, 30 years after their split?? That's just. Wow.

"Hey, nah, they had some good shit." Brendon smiles at him. "People still totally listen to their stuff still. Hear them on the radio still sometimes." He grabs another style of a Beatles shirt and holds it out for Ryan. "They really did have a big influence on today's music."

"No kidding," Ryan takes the second shirt, holding it up to look at it before deciding he's definitely getting both. "Imagine being in a world famous band," Ryan muses as he moves to look over the Blink shirts. "Having that kind of influence on music, pulling different genres together," he goes on a bit. "They changed the world, and that was just while I was around. I don't even know what effect they had afterwards."

"They did a lot for music. Making even a bit of a difference in music would be fantastic." Brendon says with a smile, going to grab a Blink shirt for himself as well. "Being in a band and changing the world. Could you imagine that?" He sighs with another smile. "Maybe one day."

"Maybe," Ryan laughs. "You play anything?" 

"Drums! And guitar, kinda. Tried trumpet but I was like 'fuck that,' almost quit band, but didn't." Brendon says a bit proudly. "Instruments are cool as hell."

Ryan nods in agreement. He's only really played his guitar and sang, but maybe with their help something could come of it. What, two guitars, a bass, and drums? That's the making of a band right there. And Ryan wouldn't mind doing some vocals. He rocks on his heels a bit as they head over to buy the shirts and suggests that idea to Brendon. It's something they all seem interested in, right?

"Actually making a band?" Brendon gives it some thought. "Maybe like, once summer starts up we can jam or something, but I doubt my parents would let me like, do anything serious until I'm older. Like shows and shit. Ask Spin though, he has too much damn free time," Brendon laughs as he pays for his shirt and then Ryan pays for his own.

"Keep it in mind?" He asks with a bit of a smile. It wouldn't be playing along side The Beatles, but playing music with his friends seems like it could be a close second. He's definitely okay with passing the idea along to Spencer though. He's sure that he'd be open to it. "Thanks for today though, Bren. And for accepting the whole... y'know." Ryan gives a bit of a shrug, not wanting to just burst it out in public.

Brendon just kind of shrugs. "No problem, man. Honestly the when is weirder than the what," he laughs a bit. "I mean, shit, weren't computers fucking huge in the 60s? You're fucking advanced beyond even modern tech."

"I wouldn't say that.." Okay, maybe it is true. He isn't totally sure the extent of today's technology, but it's definitely better than what he grew up with. Ryan quietly wonders if there's more like him out there. More androids. More perfected, self-updating kinds that didn't have too much of their data put in to emotional attachment to things. He definitely was ahead of his time for when he was made, but with today's tech he probably pales in comparison to whatever else is out there.

"Androids are still a dream of the future, man," Brendon laughs as they leave Hot Topic. "They don't exist. But here you are," he adds with a bit of flair, motioning towards Ryan. "What's left, shoes? Oh, and you so need new guitar strings," Brendon pulls Ryan along, suddenly realizing that the guitar isn't a hand-me-down like Ryan had said. It's his own. So yeah. Guitar strings. Make it sound better, but not having to replace it. It means a lot to the android, he totally understands.

"Really, thanks again." Ryan repeats. This has been a pretty good day so far. He's got a decent haul of clothes, he's getting some new strings, and all the while hanging out with a friend who knows the truth about him and doesn't seem to mind. He never could have imagined this to be his current reality. He thought he'd forever be in that house with those scientists.

"No problem, buddy," Brendon smiles. "It's the start of a beautiful friendship," he takes Ryan's hand and does a few skips before letting go and laughing, smiling wide. "Really though. You're fucking cool. And they sure made you pretty," he winks.

"You're not bad lookin' yourself. For not being man-made anyway." Ryan laughs and runs a hand through his hair in attempt to try and fix the mess that it is, feeling a bit more self-conscious about his looks now that Brendon has mentioned it. He isn't sure how much the scientists influenced his appearance at all. They probably just played around with some DNA until they got something that would live long and be healthy. The looks probably didn't matter too much to them. He did start out as a baby after all. Supposed to age at the same rate as every human.

"Aw, you think so? Mom always said I was the prettiest," he laughs. "Okay, no, my sister's the prettiest. I look like shit. But hey, puberty, right?" Brendon walks along with Ryan until the video game store catches his eye. "Come on, I've gotta show you how cool this stuff is." He didn't even really pay attention to how advanced technology is until he realized this is all brand new to Ryan. Now suddenly it's all cool as shit. Ryan laughs again as he's basically dragged inside the store. A bit of a detour from their plans, but he doesn't mind. Video games weren't really a thing at all when he was growing up. But within thirty years it seems to have made a huge market for itself. 

"There's so much." He comments as he glances around at all the shelves.

"Most of it's boring. But there's some sweet stuff," he shows him some of the sweet N64 games and also the PlayStation, which he doesn't have at home. "It's fucking amazing, dude, and they keep getting better." He shows him the demos they have and lets him figure it out for himself.

Ryan does manage to get the hang of video games pretty quickly. Brendon attributes it to the fact he's part machine, but it's actually probably due to the fact that Brendon is pretty sucky at video games. They play some of the demos for a while before Brendon remembers they're actually at the mall for a reason and they should get back on track.

"If this is what happened in the last thirty years," Ryan starts as they leave the store. "Imagine what's coming!" 

"Probably more fuckin nerdy androids," Brendon nudges him with his elbow. "Seriously though, why did they even turn you off or whatever? You're advanced as hell."    


Ryan shrugs a bit, smile fading. "Too good at being human or some shit, I think. Why spend millions building what you can make biologically for free? I ended up being nothing special. Just proof that science is cool." He scuffs his feet as he walks a bit. Fuck science. They turned him off because why spend millions on a normal kid that doesn't do anything different than a cheaper human kid? And he had no rights, according to the government or whoever. Just a machine. So yeah. Fuck that shit.

"Well you're still fucking cooler than most people I know." Brendon says. "Not quite as cool as me though." He teases. Honestly he thinks that whole android thing is sweet as hell. Even if he's got robotic parts or whatever, he still looks and acts totally human which is freakin' amazing. He only expected that stuff from movies and books, not real life stuff like this. "Spin and I will help you fit in, dude, don't worry."

It's a tough situation, to wake up in a new world. Somehow, Ryan was lucky enough to find friends. And apparently family. He's feeling okay, he'll probably take some time to really get used to everything, some time to grieve and emotionally let everything sink in, but he'll be okay. He's pretty sure. George Ryan Ross the Third is gonna be just fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :') Let us know what u think babes


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